


Fatal

by AyeletSita



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Anger, Camp Half-Blood, Can be read as Thaluke, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Depressing, F/M, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, I Made Myself Cry, I swear it's really just implied, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Luke deserved better, Messing up, Mostly the kind that has nothing to do with blood, Or not, POV Third Person Limited, The Diary of Luke Castellan, nothing descriptive at all, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-11
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-10-30 15:22:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10879578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AyeletSita/pseuds/AyeletSita
Summary: "So, what's my fatal flaw?" He asked jokingly after a long, comfortable silence. He couldn't quite see Thalia in the dim light, but knowing her as well as he did, he didn't actually had to."Well, that's easy," said Thalia and he could hear the smirk in her voice. "You're a dirty thief, Luke Castellan." Luke made a face."What's mine?" Asked Thalia."Well, that's easy," he teased with a wide grin that made Thalia groan. "You're an insensitive jerk, Thalia Grace." Thalia laughed, Annabeth stirred in her sleep and they stayed quiet for the rest of the night.Thalia Grace's fatal flaw was not being insensitive, it was not being reckless, it was not being arrogant and Luke knew it better than anyone else. He didn't say anything, though, because this wasn't the kind of things anyone wanted to hear, not even from your own best friend....They were called fatal for a reason.





	Fatal

**Author's Note:**

> I've written most of this from 11pm to 4am, on a night before an English final, because I just couldn't stop. Ever since I've read The Diary of Luke Castellan, I keep writing new stuff about him but this is the first finished thing I've got. The thing I always come back to is that Luke was no an evil man, he was just an angry kid, and if someone had only sone anything, anything at all, he wouldn't have turned out the way he did.  
> This is the story of the Tragedy of Luke Castellan, but this is also a story about friendship and family and grief and having the good and the bad mashed together. It's very non-linear but I did my best to show either by Luke's or some else's age when the scene takes place. If something is still unclear, feel free to ask. In my head, this is a Thaluke fanfic but it's can also be read as platonic relationship because, well, there was never much more to it, was it?  
> Warning: canon compliant.

Ironically enough, it was the youngest member of their small group who told them about fatal flaws. It would take her six more years to whisper about it again, finally admitting her own limits. Back then, though, at the age of seven, Annabeth couldn't quite comprehend how the story she told her newly found family concerns her. She'd never actually told Luke when it finally changed, and she realized what her fatal flaw actually was, but Luke knew anyway, knowing people was always his forte. Little Annie fell asleep, head in Thalia's lap, early that night and the "adults" stayed up, keeping watch.

"So, what's my fatal flaw?" He asked jokingly after a long, comfortable silence. He couldn't quite see Thalia in the dim light, but knowing her as well as he did, he didn't actually had to.

"Well, that's easy," said Thalia and he could hear the smirk in her voice. "You're a dirty thief, Luke Castellan." Luke made a face. Thalia knew how much he hated being called a thief, how much he hated _being_ a thief. It was probably the reason he replied the way he did.

"What's mine?" Asked Thalia.

"Well, that's easy," he teased with a wide grin that made Thalia groan. "You're an insensitive jerk, Thalia Grace." Thalia laughed, Annabeth stirred in her sleep and they stayed quiet for the rest of the night.

Thalia Grace's fatal flaw was not being insensitive, it was not being reckless, it was not being arrogant and Luke knew it better than anyone else. He didn't say anything, though, because this wasn't the kind of things anyone wanted to hear, not even from your own best friend.

Six years later, he'd try to use the knowledge to win her back. He should've known better.

 

Luke remembered the day he realized he's known Annabeth for longer than he's known Thalia. He'd spent the next couple of nights sitting on Half Blood Hill, his back again the infamous pine tree, and a bunch of old calendars thrown in his lap. Luke was never much for math, but that few days, couple of weeks even, he counted thousands of days with and without her.

Luke didn't quite remember the tears that streamed down his face as he placed their adventures on the paper. He did remember the rage he felt as he wrote down her date of death. He remember the hot, blinding anger that possessed him to shout with all of his might. He didn't quite remember being afraid someone might hear him and come check on him.

In Luke's memory, he shouted and shouted until his voice was no more. He kicked that stupid, stupid pine tree and could almost smell the blood again.

 

Luke could also remember the day Annabeth turned thirteen. Truly and fully older than Thalia ever was. By this point, Luke had already done too much to back away. Still, it was that day, less than a month after his new lord's plan failed spectacularly, that Luke decided to leave the only home he's ever known.

(He told himself as he walked away from the dying boy Thalia's age that home wasn't a place, it was a person and Luke has been homeless for quite some time, no point in start crying now).

 

Annabeth was a little girl with a big hammer and a huge book instead of a teddy bear. She didn't actually know how to read yet when she met Thalia and Luke, but she loved the pictures in that book so badly she refused to let it go.

(Luke remembered her quietly weeping the night after they finally lost it. Even as young as she was, his little Annie was strong and wouldn't cry out loud. He remembered hugging her a bit tighter as no words of comfort came to his mouth).

Luke wasn't much of a reader but Thalia was dyslexic and seven-years-old Annabeth had huge, pleading eyes. They all sat together on a public bench, Thalia's head on his right shoulder, Annabeth's head pressed into his chest and the giant book sitting on his lap. He pronounced every long word carefully, not really understanding the descriptions of building methods and what not but continuing to read slowly. He stopped every once in a while to glance at the glint in the blonde girl's eyes and then he read on.

Luke thought that's how happiness felt like. Nine years later, he's still pretty sure he was right.

 

There was a time a day couldn't go by without Luke being called an idiot at least once. Thalia loved telling him he was being stupid.

"You're corrupting her!" Complained Luke as Thalia wrapped some make-shift bandage around his arm and Little Annie giggled about him being so silly and not ducking like he was supposed to, like he taught her to. It only made both girls laugh harder.

"Someone needs to deflate your ego" was Thalia's response once she finally calmed down enough to talk.

"I hate you," he grumbled and made a face. Annabeth found it hilarious and made it her duty to tease him, just like Thalia, every chance she's got.

Maybe, if it hadn't been over four years since he was last told off for being an idiot, Luke wouldn't have agreed with the voice.

Luke wasn't stupid, not really, not ever. He was just reckless, short-sighted and even more hotheaded. He didn't forget to duck because he was distracted, he didn't duck because that monster hurt Thalia, and that monster thought it could get him to back away, and as Luke's vision turned red, he refused to badge. Consequences be damned.

 

When Luke was seven, some kind of priest came to their class to educate them about religion or something. He talked about the seven deadly sins, nothing too dramatic, with no "you'll be doom to all eternity in hell if you do this!" Just your normal, religion tasted lecture about being good little boys and girls.

He told them about Gluttony, explaining it is wanting more and more, even when you had enough, like when you eat all of the candies at home so your little siblings wouldn't get any, although it gave you a huge stomachache.

He said that Sloth meant being lazy, not doing stuff you should because it's too hard.

He didn't have to explain Envy, at the age of seven, the kids were already familiar with the word. Envy, he explained nonetheless, was being jealous of other kid for having a new bicycle, or getting a better sandwich for lunch.

Pride the kids didn't quite understand, because they were just kids, and kids don't really understand when the "you must believe in yourself" ends and "you shouldn't be overconfident" start. They just nodded politely as the priest explained about modesty and pretended they cared at all.

He stuttered a bit when he mentioned Lust, because those were kids he was talking to, and Lust was the last thing on their mind.

Greed was familiar too, even if the word itself rang alien. Greed was about the evil men they read stories about, the ones that would do everything for more money. Greed didn't quite applied to them, because they were Good.

Wrath was the easiest to explain, and the hardest to wrap you head around.

"But Ms. Thompson is angry with us all the time!" Protested a young girl with piggy tails named Linda.

"And my mom always yell at me when I don't clean my room!" Added a chubby boy named Ben.

Wrath was the hardest, because they all did Wrath. The priest tried to talk about violence, about losing control, but the class was already lost to him. It seemed appropriate, somehow.

At the age of seven, a priest told Luke about deadly sins. At the age of fourteen, Annabeth told him about fatal flaws.

In the end, in made sense that the things that could kill you would be the same.

 

Hermes cabin was always the most crowded cabin in Camp Half Blood. For the first few weeks Luke couldn't resent it more. Later, the emotion would dim, only spark back up when he'd remember once again the sheer amount of kids whose parents didn't bother to claim.

The first few weeks, though, Luke hated it for much more selfish reasons. After spending five years pretty much alone, with the exception of Thalia and then Annabeth, sleeping in the same room with other thirty or so people was just awful. All the sounds, all the smells, no privacy to speak of and barely enough air to breath.

At the very beginning, it wasn't that bad, because Annabeth was with him. Little Annie was still small enough to feel comfortable with cuddling with him at night. With her entrusted in his arms, sleeping in Cabin Eleven wasn't that bad. Luke had slept in worst places, in worst things than old sleeping bags. As long as he could focus his mind of protecting Annabeth he was okay.

The nightmares were hard, but almost everyone at Camp Half Blood suffered from nightmares, nobody made a big deal when someone woke up in the middle of the night screaming. After years on the streets, Luke knew how to keep quiet and anyway, Annabeth usually noticed when he was having a nightmare and woke him up. He did her the same favor.

Then, of course, Annabeth was officially claimed, sent away to her own half-siblings and Cabin Eleven was suddenly much less tolerable.

 

Luke didn't hate his mom. It took him running away, spending five years on the street, three more years in Camp Half Blood and watching his friends die in front of him to admit it, but Luke did not hate his mom.

Luke did hate his father.

When you're five-years-old, and your mom grabs you and shake your shoulders, screaming you're going to die, and you go and hide under your bed, and then switch to your closet when she start realizing that's where you're, you hate your dad because he's not there to save you.

When you're eight-years-old and lonely because you're the weird kid with the crazy mom and you can't have friends at home, because you have a crazy mom, and you're so, so hungry sometimes that you just sneak out of the house to steal something and end up living off candies and ice cream, all because of your crazy mom, you hate your dad for not being the parent you so desperately need.

When you're seventeen, though, and you're scarred and you're traumatized and you've just slept with a girl for the first time in your life, you think about your mom and how someone could possibly think she was in any state to agree to anything, let alone sex. You think about your teachers who called your mom dozens of times, never received an answer yet supposedly never report the incident. You think about the way she sometimes seized and stopped breathing and you were sure this time was it, she was going to die. You think about how that father of yours, that god, didn't just ignore you. This wasn't evil by doing nothing. This evil by doing evil.

Luke almost goes to visit his mom thousand times after that. He went as far as making some phone calls, pretending to be from a newspaper, Electricity Company, the police to make sure she's actually alive and well, or at least as well so someone like her could be. Actually coming to see it, though, that he didn't – couldn't – do.

Luke was twenty-one-years-old when he returned to that damned house. It's been seven years. At some point during those seven years, May Castellan stopped looking scary and start looking sad.

Luke half expected her not to recognize him but he should've known better. She embraced him tightly, as strongly and as furiously as any true mother would, no matter how insane. Luke cried like a baby.

Once he walked away, he never looked back. Some wounds never heal, there's only a thin scab separating you from bleeding out through them. Luke knew better than to mess with a wound like that more than once.

 

Annabeth was nine-years-old when she found Luke one afternoon, young and scared, with tears streaming down her face and her hair so messy it looked like a blonde mane around her small face.

She ran to reach him, sitting at the swordfights arena, ran into him, really. For a second, all Luke felt was warmth. It's been a while since Annabeth hugged him; it was only natural, really. The little blonde grew older, grew shier in some ways and bolder in others and didn't find it appropriate to cuddle with Luke like they used to.

"What is it, Annie?" He asked in a soft voice. Annabeth shivered a bit as he pronounced the nickname, the one he didn't use for who knows how long. The one Thalia distractedly gifted her one day in the middle of a run. The one no one else was allowed to use.

Annabeth Chase, age nine, looked Luke straight in the eyes and muttered one word.

It was the first time in a long, oh so long time, that the girl Luke swore to protect looked at him with her big, pleading eyes like that. Like he was a hero. Like he could fix everything. Like he could save her. It was certainly the first time since Luke came back to Camp Half Blood, bloodied and scarred and alone, and for a second there, it made all the shitty feelings he felt during all that time okay.

"Spider!" Muttered Annabeth and tears glinted in her eyes. Another person would've found it funny. Even at the age of nine, Annabeth had a fearsome reputation as a tough girl, one that could not be fazed easily, yet here she was reduced to tears because of a small bug.

Luke, though. Luke knew about the spider bites and the lonely nights. He knew about cruel ignorance and cold refusal and small, tiny weaknesses you could never quite shake off. Luke knew Annabeth and he knew spiders were not, in fact, bugs.

"It's okay, Annie, I've got you," he swore as he wrapped the girl in his arms and in that moment, Luke renewed his vow to never let down his family the way his family was let down before. Promises didn't just die out because you failed once, they were just made more desperate.

 

During the first year after her death, Luke would avoid the tree at any cost. Annabeth would mention, from time to time, how it looked like. She drew a picture of it once, back when she still liked drawing. Luke tried to nod politely but he couldn't look at the paper, not without throwing up.

It was during that first year that Luke studied harder than he ever did in his life. Lee Fletcher sat him down on a chair and made him drink some tea as he explained about abdominal wounds and bleeding out. It would be him, too, that explained it again and again, in steady voice, what happened to heroes once they died.

"They go to the Underworld," he repeated in a patient voice as he and Luke climbed side by side on the lava-spitting climbing wall. "Get a trial," he continued. "Declared worthy, and sent to Elysium."

Luke had no doubt that Thalia was worthy. He had tons of doubts about the fairness of the Underworld's justice system, though, and the fucks Zeus would give if his daughter would be sent to the Fields of Punishments, just because Hades felt like it.

Lee explained it to him again, no judgement in his hoarse voice, and Luke pretended to believe.

When he finally came back to the Hill, finally looked at the tree from up close, Luke didn't feel anything. The feelings would come later, warm and wet and violent. At that moment, though, he just stared at the hard trunk, felt the withering pine needles and thought about how meaningless they all were if Thalia Freaking Grace could just die and leave nothing behind.

Five years later, Luke would pour poison into the tree and feel no remorse. He'd actually feel a bit satisfied, thinking about the so called King of the Gods, sitting on his throne, looking how his beautiful wards-battery was being decomposed.

Five years later, Luke would stare in horror as the truth was entrusted in him. He would think about seven-years-old Annabeth's painting and he would throw up.

Eight years later, Luke would still carry the guilt with him and in more than one way, it was heavier than the sky.

 

Percy Jackson was Thalia's age when she died. He had her hair and her way of rolling her eyes. Percy Jackson was Annabeth's age. He had her lost look in his eyes, the one that made Luke want to kill the person who dared closing his eyes at that kid's struggles. Percy Jackson was Luke's age the day he's seen someone die for the very first time and he had the same firewood piled up in his stomach, waiting to be lit up.

Luke trained Percy Jackson. He got nightmares for it, threats and reminders and pain. Luke continued to train Percy Jackson, though, because he couldn't help but think about family as he looked at the too short, too thin and too easy to kill young boy.

Less than two months later, Luke would sentence that boy for death but that few days, before he knew for sure, before he was ordered, before he was forced, before he gave up because the price of one boy's life was _worth it_ , he trained him to be the greatest swordsman he could ever be.

Percy Jackson wouldn't spend a lot of times training in his life, nor would he win many tournaments and usually, when come face to face with a master, he'd talk his way out of the situation. He would fight many enemies, though, one of them being Luke himself, and as he'd do it, it would be the older boy's voice that would echo in his mind.

As far as legacies goes, Luke decided there were worst things to leave behind.

 

Luke would only come to stare at Thalia through a window once. He'd watch as she struggled through class and snicker as he thought about that girl, who wasn't in school since third grade, sitting in an eighth grade Math class and trying to understand what the hades is going on.

Luke didn't cry that day. He laughed. He was elated. He watched that girl, who was too old to be the Thalia he remembered yet too young to be the Thalia she was supposed to be, and smiled.

Luke was twenty when he felt hope again for the first time in years. It would take less than six months to sniff it away.

Looking back, it seemed weird that it was during the time he was the strongest that his lord managed to make him do his worst. It really would've been unexplainable to someone who ate up Luke's lies. Someone like Luke himself.

Luke swore himself to the King of the Titans with words about safety and family and justice ringing in his ears. Those motives should've been deemed invalid as he watched Thalia Grace attempting to solve a mathematical equation. He didn't back away, though, because this was never about safety or justice. This was always about revenge.

The family bit, though, Luke refused to let go of.

 

When the voice started talking to him, it was about glory and greatness and power. It was about right of birth. Luke Castellan, aged eleven, cared very little for either of them. It was few weeks later that he run into a nine-years-old girl with hair blacker than the sky at night and the voice quieted down.

When it came back, three years later, Luke had listen. He only start obeying, though, the day after he returned from his quest. His wounded eye screamed in pain from beneath the wraps as salty tears spurted out of it. The Camp would talk for years to come about how Luke managed to mess up an easy quest with clear instructions. About the two other fools that went along with him no one spoke of, their names were burned with the shrouds that held nothing within them.

Their names were Andrew and Gary and Luke spent two weeks driving with them across the US before they died, first Gary, on their way, and then Andrew in that cursed garden.

The voice spoke and Luke, fifteen and scarred and no longer handsome and charming, replied.

"Yes, my lord".

 

Luke remembered the day most of them showed up. Beckendorf appeared on a Saturday, two weeks before Luke turned eighteen. We was young and wide eyed as he watched this new, magical world he discovered.

"He looks like an idiot," he commented to Lee during target practice and made his friend snort.

"Well, look at him, it's obvious who his daddy is," replied the slightly younger teen. Luke hummed in agreement.

"And we all know how dumb their sort could be," he finished. They laughed guiltily together as Lee hit the target and Luke sometimes not completely missed it. The kid learnt, though, the hard way, like they all did. He didn't stay twelve year old forever.

Daisy reached Camp on October, just a couple of days before Halloween, when Luke was sixteen. She was not wide eyed, she was not naïve. She was of the same age as Luke and of the same parentage as Annabeth. By the end of the summer, she'd already be a counselor.

He remembered the day Brian came because it was the same day David left. Luke shook the hand of the now former head of Cabin Six a bit more firmly than what was absolutely necessary when he noticed the boy and the dracaena chasing him.

Brian was welcomed into Cabin Eleven, after Anna, one of Lee's sisters, tended to his wounds. Luke had given him a sleeping bag, a place on the floor and a tender smile. Brian left Camp Half Blood's safe borders seven months later and his body has never been found.

Silena was thirteen when she came around. As she walked down the bloody hill there were many doubts in her heart but one certainty remained, she had a place there. That's what she told Luke as he comforted her during her first evening. She murmured the words between tears.

"That's right," he agreed in a gentle voice, "Camp can be a bit scary but really, we're family, we'll look after you." Silena didn't bury her face in Luke's chest like Little Annie used to. She did squeeze his hand and gifted him with a teary, grateful smile.

 She was claimed shortly after but kept sending him that thanking smile from the Aphrodite table for every day up until he left.

 

Luke stole his first car when he was thirteen (a rust Toyota Carola he and Thalia drove in all through Pennsylvania) and his last when he was nineteen (a red Peugeot that reeked of cigarettes). He told his first lie at three ("It not me!") and his last at twenty three ("Think... rebirth. Try for three times. Isles of the Blest.")

He wasn't any better in between.

 

"Luke…" Said Thalia hesitantly across from the camp fire they've lit for once. She was already lying on her side, eyes closed up until now, waiting for sleep to take her over.

"Yes?" Asked Luke, still wide awake as their guard, a little blonde girl's head in his lap.

"Would you… Would you… understand if I wanted him to be right?" Stammered the usually confident girl. It was only two days since they've stumbled across Annabeth, less than three days since they've encountered Hal with his sad life and sad death and scary as all hades prophecies.

"Don't get me wrong, I know he says something about you, and I hope that's bullshit but…" Tried Thalia to explain.

"He said something," completed Luke, "about you family. Is it about you dad?" Thalia shook her head.

That night, Luke heard for the first and last time the story of Jason Grace. The part Thalia knew, that is.

Nearly a decade later the very same Jason Grace would find a picture of Luke in a moldy cabin. He'd never know the full story of the older demigod, just like said demigod never got to know his.

 

Holding up the sky was a hard. The sky was heavy, so heavy that no amount of physical strength could allow you to tolerate it even for a second. The only way not to crash, and bring the world down with you, was by the power of will.

Luke thought about that particular plan a lot before executing it. It was a risky one. It gave him a lot of time to think about what he had that could allow him to hold on for long enough. The answer was two girls and stories and dreams and a fatal flaw. He held on the sky.

As he walked away, once he tricked Annabeth to take the burden away from him, as the plan dictated, his heart stammered as she yelled at him for help. Later, when Percy Jackson would take the sky for only a few minutes he wouldn't be able to murmur a single word because the weight would be too much for him. Annabeth Chase, though, was stronger, she had a whole different kind of strength, the same kind of strength that allowed Luke to do so. Luke was never even a tiny bit surprised.

 

Thalia Grace's fatal flaw was her thirst for power; Annabeth Chase's fatal flaw was Pride; Percy Jackson would do anything to save a friend, including letting the world burn and Luke Castellan couldn't let go of his anger. As he gave himself away to his lord, ready and empty and willing to die, Luke could see it all clearly.

He gave up life and happiness and safely and easy and warm and _good_ for the chance to kill Zeus for not saving his best friend.

_Zeus did save his best friend, his best friend was alive, his motive was null and void and the anger burned on._

They were called fatal for a reason.


End file.
